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‘Are you okay? You’re looking kind of...pink,’ Flynn asked, leaning in. Helena supposed to the crowds of guests it looked as if he was murmuring sweet nothings in his bride’s ear. Not asking her why her complexion had coloured to match her shoes.
‘It’s the corset. It was okay standing up but now it’s kind of...binding.’ Which it was supposed to be, really. It was just that Helena was so very fond of oxygen. And dessert.
Flynn didn’t answer immediately. Helena glanced up to see his cheeks approaching shoe colour, too. ‘I’m sorry. Do you want me to...?’ He trailed off, waving a hand behind her back.
Helena shook her head. ‘Too late now. It’ll be fine. I just need to make it through the speeches then I’ll escape and find a maid or someone to adjust it.’
‘Just don’t let any of the guests see you.’ Flynn flashed her a quick grin. ‘You’ll have the rumour mill announcing you’re pregnant in no time.’
Pregnant. Of course. Because she was married now. And that was what married women did, wasn’t it? Gave their husbands babies.
Isabella probably wouldn’t even cry and send her away this time.
This time, it wouldn’t be a scandal, a shameful thing. It would be wanted, loved. Kept.
And the fact it might break her heart again still wouldn’t matter.
A waiter reached in to clear her barely touched plate and Helena murmured a thank you, more grateful for the interruption to her thoughts than the service.
‘Time for the speeches next,’ she said, visualising the timetable for the day as she’d seen it on the wedding planner’s clipboard.
‘And your dad’s up first. At least he always makes a good speech.’
Helena stared at him in disbelief, but Flynn appeared utterly unaware of what he’d said. ‘A good speech?’
‘Well, yeah.’ Flynn shrugged. ‘Doesn’t he? I mean, he does all those charity event speaker things, and he always talks well to the board. And I thought he did pretty well last night, at the rehearsal dinner.’
Helena shook her head. ‘No wonder Thea slept with Zeke,’ she muttered. After listening to their father’s speech about her the night before—including, amongst other things, a line about how glad he was that, by agreeing to marry Flynn, Thea had finally made a decision in her personal life as good as the ones she made in business—even Helena had been ready to flee the room. And Flynn hadn’t even noticed that his fiancée might have been a bit upset.
She wondered what little gems Dad would have in store for her. Assuming that he’d taken the time to rewrite it from his original speech, as planned for Thea. He might not. They seemed fairly interchangeable to him today—neither one of his daughters living up to what he wanted or expected from them.
She didn’t have to wait long to find out. The moment the last of the plates were cleared, Thomas Morrison was on his feet, carefully clinking the silverware against a champagne flute.
‘Ladies and gentlemen, friends and family, welcome—welcome to you all!’ Thomas smiled broadly around at the assembled company, and Helena wondered exactly how much of the champagne he’d had that afternoon.
‘On this very special day, I’d like to thank you all for travelling to be with us, not just on my own behalf, but on behalf of my dear old friends, Ezekiel and Isabella, too. I know that they feel, as I do, that this day would not have been so magical without all of you here to share it.’
Pause for applause. Flynn did have a point, although she’d never admit as much. Her father knew how to play a crowd.
It was just a shame he didn’t know how to make his own daughters feel as special.
‘This day, this joining of our two families, has been long coming, and long desired. Not just for the obvious reasons of business—although I know several of you very pleased to see your stocks and shares safe for another generation!’ Laughter, mostly from a table of middle-aged men in pinstriped suits with much younger wives towards the back of the room. ‘No, I have far greater reasons for wanting to see our families irrevocably linked.’
Helena swallowed at the word irrevocably, and felt Flynn flinch beside her. Was he thinking about how to get out of this marriage, like she was? Or was he plotting how to keep her in it?
‘Helena, my Helena, has always been my golden child. My baby girl. And to see her safe and secure with a man such as Flynn, a man I already trusted with my company, is quite frankly a joy!’
If her cheeks had been pink from oxygen deprivation before, then they had to be bright red and clashing with her shoes by now. As she stared at her full champagne glass, watching the bubbles rise and pop, Flynn sneaked his hand into hers and she squeezed gratefully.
‘Flynn—’ Thomas turned to address his new son-in-law directly ‘—you have been given a precious gift today. I expect you to take very good care of it.’
‘I will, sir.’ Flynn’s voice was sure and certain, and the whole room burst into applause again at the sound of it.
‘Okay, maybe he’s not dreadful at speeches,’ Helena murmured to Flynn but, even as she said it, Thomas launched into a long, overdone thank you speech to Isabella for all she’d done in helping to raise her and organise the day. ‘Sometimes.’
‘Wait until you hear mine,’ Flynn teased. But Helena tensed at the very idea. What on earth was he going to say? Hi, guys, I know you came to see me marry that other girl but, hey, change of plan and, under the circumstances, this was the best I could do. More champagne, anyone?
‘This you’re worried about?’ Flynn asked, his voice low but amazed. ‘Marrying a guy you never even considered as a possible date on no notice in someone else’s wedding dress, fine. But the thought of me making a speech makes you tense up? You don’t need the corset, your shoulders are so rigid.’
‘Not the thought of you making a speech. The thought of you adapting a speech about Thea to suit me on the spot. The fact that everyone here will know you’re actually talking about another woman.’
Flynn didn’t reply immediately, and when Helena looked up his expression was thoughtful. ‘Just wait and listen,’ he said finally, just as Thomas asked the room to be upstanding for the bride and groom.
‘To Flynn and Helena!’ She supposed she should just be glad that most people managed to get her name right.
Flynn got to his feet as everyone else sat down, and Helena gave up worrying about the tightness of her corset laces. It wasn’t as if she could breathe while this was going on anyway.
‘It’s traditional, I know, for the groom to toast the bridesmaids,’ he started.
Helena winced instinctively. That’s right—draw attention to exactly what’s untraditional about this wedding.
‘But, as you might have noticed, my wife and I don’t actually have any today.’
A nervous laugh, and not even the usual cheer at the use of ‘my wife and I’. Yeah, this was going to go brilliantly.
‘A lot of things about today’s wedding might not have been exactly as people were expecting. But, in fact, everything is just as it should be.’
He smiled down at her and something in Helena’s chest loosened, for the first time that day.
‘All along, we knew we wanted to join our families together, to go into the future as a pair, a team. We wanted to secure our future, and our future happiness. But you can’t make a plan for love; you can’t schedule romance and desire. You can’t outsmart Cupid, as Helena and I learned.’
It was all true, Helena realised. Everything he was saying accurately described Thea and Zeke’s discoveries and disappointments of the last couple of days. But the way he said it, the way he smiled lovingly at her as he spoke...it was as if he were telling a different story altogether.
Their story.
‘Duty is one thing; family duty something altogether heavier. But true love...well, true love trumps them all.’ Women w
ere ‘aahing’ around the tables, and Helena thought she might even have seen one of the middle-aged men in the pinstriped suits wipe at his eyes. How was Flynn doing this?
‘I truly believe that our wedding today is just the first stop on a journey of a lifetime. With Helena, I feel like I have come home at last. Together we, and our families, have a wonderful future ahead of us. And I couldn’t be prouder to have my wife by my side as we venture into it.’
Flynn tugged her up to stand beside him, one arm wrapped around her waist, and raised his glass. ‘To Helena,’ he said, and the room echoed with the repeats.
And just for a moment, standing there in her sister’s too tight wedding dress with the wrong shoes pinching her feet, Helena could see the future Thea had planned for herself. A future of acceptance and appreciation, having a man beside her who always managed to say the right thing at the right time.
It almost seemed like the fairy tale it was supposed to be. For a moment, anyway. Until her guests started calling for something more.
‘Kiss her!’ Mr Teary-Pinstripes called. ‘Kiss, kiss, kiss, kiss!’ The rest of his table picked up the chant. Then the rest of the room.
Suddenly, Helena almost wished the corset was tight enough to make her faint.
